Concepts of Beauty in Philosophy
There are many different perceptions of beauty. Some believe that beauty comes from within; some believe that it is simplicity, and some believe it lies in perfection. I am going to explore some of the more famous concepts of beauty from philosophers prior to the Renaissance. I believe that in any study of philosophy, Plato is a good starting point. Plato expressed his beliefs on the topic of beauty in his text 'Symposium'. The general theme in 'Symposium' is love. Socrates sets forth his view through a conversation with Diotima of Mantineia, who believes that you should be taught to appreciate and love true beauty. The theory is as follows. At an early age, you should be taught to love beauty represented by a beautiful body, a human body. When this is realised, you can see that this body shares beauty with other beautiful bodies and this becomes the basis of loving all beautiful bodies and not just one. Then the learner should realise that the beauty of souls is superior to the beauty of bodies. The second stage is to love beautiful practises and customs and to recognise that all beautiful customs share a certain charm, or beauty. Then, the learner should recognise beauty in all different kinds of knowledge. Socrates thinks that the final stage should be experiencing beauty itself as something not embodied by anything physical or spiritual. In 'Symposium', Plato draws a
What does it mean to be alive?
What does it mean to be alive? It is an odd question that, when thought about, really does curtail you. What is the definition of alive? Can one thing be more alive than another? If a list of objects were given, for example: the universe, the world, a human, a piece of paper, a tree, a thought, tomorrow, a person that is anatomically dead. Which would be more alive? The Universe, because it contains everything else? Or a thought because it assigns that very value to the Universe? A piece of paper more than a tree, because it has the potential to have something incredible drawn or written on it, and thus contains the life poured into it? Is tomorrow alive? It motivates action, so where does it go on the list? What about the dead person, are they alive? What if that person was Beethoven, or another famous musician or person in history. Do they live through the legacy of their actions? It's a question so convoluted by arbitrary criteria, and a lack of a definitive 'dead' as a contrast. Because Alive is subjective to individual interpretation, there can be no perfect answer in the frame of the question. The best possible answer is in the terms and ideas of each individual. The question of what it means to be alive is superseded by the ability to give meaning to life. There is no answer except that each individual has their own answer, and any given answer's perfection is
Evolution - RS
A Christian cannot believe the creation story and theory of evolution. Do You Agree? Somebody may believe to be a Christian and an evolutionist, but this position is biblically and scientifically flawed. Jesus taught a literal view of Genesis, all the way through the Gospels He justified His doings by making reference to a literal Old Testament. Unbelievers get stumped on a simple question: "who came first 'the chicken or the egg'?" because of their evolutionary beliefs they just do not know, but for believers it is simple and can answer: "the chicken", for God created Adam and Eve and all the animals as fully-grown up. They just did not evolve over million of years. Eve was extracted from Adam and God presented her to Adam as his wife. This fact alone denies the concept of Evolution in Biblical terms. But evolutionists, very easily, deny the truthfulness of the first 3 chapters of Genesis because if the first 3 chapters of Genesis are denied, then the whole concept of Christianity falls because its foundation is in these 3 chapters. This is exactly what evolutionists want, for Evolution was invented to effectively do away with a Supreme God that has dominion over our lives imposing on us the concept of sin, as an offence against Him, for which we will have to give an account of our lives, and receive our just due. In the first 3 chapters of Genesis Good spells out what
Muslims and the west: a never ending conflict.
Menna Mansour 900-06-0504 Rhet 102-25 Essay 2, Draft 3. Dr. Verlenden Muslims and the west: a never ending conflict. When it comes to the relationship between Middle East Muslims and Western Christians, both communities, the Islamic and the Western, divide taking either side. Husain Haqqani in "Why Muslims Always Blame the West" wrote about how the Islamic communities, particularly in the Middle East, blame many societies, but mostly western, for all of the problems they currently face in their own countries. Haqqani believes that if people in the Middle East solve such problems; conflict between both sides would be minimized. Even though Haqqani has stressed numerous points that people in the Middle East and in the West should ponder upon, his essay does not put into account recent events found in the Muslim world, it helped the reader in envisioning a simplistic picture of West-East political relationships, and in addition, he jumps to several conclusions in which his support is either too little or non-existent. Haqqani misrepresented the recent events in the Islamic world in his essay. Haqqani claims that "the conduct and rhetoric of Muslim leaders and their failure to address the stagnation of their societies has also fueled the tensions between Islam and the West (Haqqani, 1)". For such conclusions to be made, fair amount of knowledge of both societies must be
Aboriginal Spirituality
Religion Essay - Aboriginal The relationship between Aboriginal spatiality and the connection of the land is based upon the dreaming and the occupation of the land for 40,000 years. For a long time now aboriginal people have lived on the land and the inhabitants have been incorporated into their spirituality. The dreaming is the integral part of aboriginal religion and refers to events about the dreaming and ancestral beings formed within the land which also created life on the land. It is also important as it is the way the Aboriginal people express their way of life and their spirituality as the land is a link to the Dreaming. The dreaming is fundamental to aboriginal beliefs and spirituality because it is the centre to aboriginal religion and life. It is portrayed in many ways these follow, art, song, mythology, stories and rituals. Dreaming is the past, present and future. It is Aboriginal people's religious framework and their worldview. The Dreaming is the concept which is the underpinning of beliefs and practices of the Aboriginal People and their communities. It is therefore important because it defines the relationships and responsibilities for all Aboriginal people. The dreaming is the explanation of why the land is the critical expression of Aboriginal spirituality. The land is where the dreaming stories are taken place and is the resting place of the ancestral
Plato on Epistemology
How do I know what I know? Question 1: Which main questions, concepts, and theories of epistemology are dealt with by your selected philosopher? As a rationalist, Plato challenges inquiries of "what we know how we know" by centralizing the human mind (conscience and thought) as the essence of knowledge. Plato often debates using his deceased mentor, Socrates, to honour Socrates' reputation as a valuable teacher. True knowledge can be rediscovered deep within the mind; otherwise known as the World of Forms. He shows evidence of innate ideas in Platonic Doctrine of Recollection. In Plato's book Republic he writes about the distinctions between knowledge and personal opinion. He uses numerous concepts and metaphors such as metaphor of the sun, the divided line, and the Allegory in the Cave. Plato theorized that seeking knowledge is independent from the physical world (world perceived by senses), there are two distinct worlds that reflect each other. "The domain where truth and reality shine resplendent," (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphor_of_the_sun) is the World of Forms, Plato predicts, which is within your mind and sustains perfection; whereas, our sensory perception is linked to the visible world (the physical world). In the physical world of changing objects Plato sees it as "Everything in this world is always becoming something else, but nothing permanently is."
Religious Freedom
Most people living in the United States assume that their first amendment rights, more specifically freedom of religion, are inherent; and they are. Religion has a long history; the first recorded religion was in Mesopotamia around 5000 BCE (Britannica). With more and more countries becoming modernized and recognizing people's individual rights, however, how many still deny freedom of religion? Is separating church and state an indispensable element in protecting a citizen's freedom of religion, or could some laws attaining to religion be beneficial in protecting religious freedom? This essay's function is to answer the above questions and give a further understanding to religious freedom around the world. One of the main reasons why pilgrims decided to travel across the Atlantic Ocean to a new world in 1620 was to escape the religious persecution in England (Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War by Nathaniel Philbrick). A lot may argue that this is why religious freedom (and for the most part today, tolerance) is so evident in our country. On the opposite side of the spectrum, however, look at Saudi Arabia. The country formed, in part, due to a holy war, has a monarchial government, and adopted the Islamic holy text, The Koran, as its constitution (BBC). It also prohibits any religion except for a conservative version of Sunni Islam (US Department of
Topic 5 - Good and Evil
TOPIC FIVE - Good and Evil * The nature of good and evil, and its origins: - Good from God, benevolence - Evil from original sin, devil, free will, theodicy of Augustine (soul deciding), theodicy of Irenaeus (soul making), strength, hope from suffering of Jesus, God suffers alongside, life after death and God beyond human understanding - Two types of evil: moral and natural * Christian beliefs about God and the Devil: - Devil initially one of Gods helpers - Became jealous so rebelled - God expelled him and he set up his home in hell - Aim is to undermine God at every possibility (Genesis 3, Job, and Matthew 4) - Disguised as snake who tempted Eve (brought original sin into the world) * The Christian responses to the problem of evil and suffering: - Evil from original sin, devil, free will, theodicy of Augustine (soul deciding), theodicy of Irenaeus (soul making), strength, hope from suffering of Jesus, God suffers alongside, life after death and God beyond human understanding * How Jesus suffered, and how his suffering helps Christians: - Christians feel they are having some kind of connection to him when they suffer - He died to save us and suffered the most, what we suffer is not the same so shouldn't complain * How Christians cope with suffering: - Jesus died for us, cope - Suffering in this life is inconsequential because heaven is perfect - It is a way
Science and Religion do they have anything to offer each other?
Transfer-Encoding: chunked CWK Science and Religion – do they have anything 28th December to offer each other? Religion and Science are both ways in which for thousands of years humans have explained theories of how things have come to be, and within recent centuries scientific explanations have evolved with the likes of Darwin and Newton proving things without the aid of Religion. Before scientific discoveries became what they are today, most people turned to Religion to explain things such as natural disaster, for example disease. Today some people choose either Science or Religion to explain theories such as the origin of the universe, but for the majority of people this shouldn’t be the question, it shouldn’t be ‘choose either one’. I don’t think so, and feel that there is room for both in this modern world that we happen to live in. Rather, I think we should ask what each has to offer one another, which is what I’ll be discussing in this essay. William Paley was a natural theist, and believed that science and religion were compatible and had more than just a passing resemblance. He believed that the scientific world and the religious world were both on the same sort of wavelength; they were both on the same track, they were both looking for the same answers, although coming at the same questions from different angles. He is renowned for
Creating a crest and motto to reflect spirituality. Religion IA4
Religion IA4 Spirituality is recognition of a feeling or sense or belief that there is something greater than myself, something more to being human than sensory experience, and that the greater whole of which we are part is cosmic or divine in nature. The elements used to create my crest consist of waves and people linking hands among the waves, along with a dolphin jumping into the waves. I used waves as the beach is a place that bring me peace and somewhere that I have enjoyed going to since I was a child. For me, a wave can represent inner emotions as a wave can either be calm and still or aggressive and uncontrolled, just like how emotions can be far beyond our control. Explain the signs and symbols used. A wave can represent forthcoming event, celebrations, hidden emotions, and threats as well as opportunities. In the bible, it says “the sea and waves roaring”, I believe that this can represent mine and other spiritual journey. My spiritual journey and beliefs are every changing, and along the way has often been confusing and made me question many of my morals and ethics. As my enneagram is a number 7, I am generally extroverted and high spirited. I constantly seek out new experiences, but I can become distracted easily and often becomes exhausting to repeat the same routine every day. I feel like waves are everchanging and unexpected, so they lie alongside my